Trump’s big obscene budget bill | Sneed Collard

The 1,116-page budget bill narrowly passed by the House of Representatives — including Montana’s Ryan Zinke and Troy Downing — contains a gift-wrapped wish list of everything President Donald Trump hoped to accomplish:

• Transfer more wealth from the poor and middle class to the ultra rich.

• Destroy our thriving clean energy industry.

• Erode health care for America’s most vulnerable populations.

• Give big industries almost unrestricted freedom to exploit our public lands.

• Eliminate restrictions on regulating the use of artificial intelligence.

Just how the House and president are accomplishing all this is complicated, devious, and expensive. It reveals just who exactly Trump and his Republican colleagues are working for. Hint: It is not Montanans.

The most glaring numbers in the bill revolve around its tax plans. In essence, these provide trillions of dollars in savings to the wealthiest Americans, while throwing the rest of us short-lived bread crumbs. Let’s say you belong to the middle 20% of earners in America and make $60,000 per year. According to the non-partisan Penn Wharton research institute and the Tax Policy Institute, your tax benefit will fall between 1.1 and 1.7% per year — $660 to $1,020. That’s something — but nowhere close to moving the needle in your situation or keeping up with inflation.

Now say you are in the top 20% and make $100,000 per year. According to the same nonpartisan analysts, your tax benefit under the new bill will be between 2.9% and 3.7% — or $2,900 to $3,700 per year. However, it is the benefits to the top 1% of earners (those making an average of about $380,000 per year) that are truly obscene — up to 4.9% per year, translating to about $18,620 on average.

You may be thinking, “Well, rich people earned that money. Shouldn’t they get more of a tax benefit?” There are at least four things wrong with that idea:

1. The percentage of tax benefit escalates sharply the wealthier you are. How, under any scenario, is that fair?

2. Much of the wealth of the uber-rich is inherited, not earned. Again, how is it fair that they receive even more tax benefits than the rest of us?

3. The wealthy — including large corporations — benefit disproportionately from America’s infrastructure and the many services that our tax dollars provide including military protection, road construction, health care for workers, and much more. Just ask yourself, “Who profits more from driving Interstate 90 or Highway 200? Me or company owners using trucks to transport billions of dollars worth of goods?” It’s a no-brainer that because the wealthy benefit more, they should pay more to keep our society safe, healthy and functioning.

4. Perhaps most dishonestly, some of the tax benefits for middle- and low-income earners are temporary. For instance, the bill increases the child tax credit by $500 to $2,500 — but only through the year 2028, the next presidential election year. Then, it drops back to $2,000. Also, an estimated 4.5 million children will become ineligible for this credit under the new rules.

The most obscene thing about their entire plan is that Trump and his allies propose paying for their gifts to the wealthy by cutting Medicaid and other basic services for millions of Americans and by increasing our national debt by a whopping three to four trillion dollars. Even if you are an ardent MAGA supporter, this should give you pause and reveal the true colors of Trump’s America. It ain’t red, white and blue. It is the color of cash — but only if you already have a ton of it.